Varieties of Carbon Governance: Taking Stock of the Local Carbon Market in India

Judged by the sheer number of clean development mechanism (CDM) projects registered and in the pipeline, India undoubtedly can be seen as a success story as far as the functioning of the local carbon market is concerned. However, questions are repeatedly raised about the efficient working of the CDM, its distributional quality, its effectiveness in meeting broader societal goals, its impacts on sustainable development, to name but a few. This calls for a careful scrutiny and understanding of how exactly carbon governance works in the specific case of India. As demonstrated in the article, India presents a case of market-dominated carbon governance taking place under a weak shadow of hierarchy and with little civil society involvement. This article derives at the overall conclusion that the specific trajectories characterizing the local Indian carbon market point toward globally diverging carbon governance.